Editor’s note: The graduate students quoted in the article are speaking independently and not on behalf of the University or the Graduate Student Assembly.
For David Spicer, president of the Graduate Student Assembly, the University faculty council was a crucial space for advocacy. He said he worked with the faculty council in the spring to raise issues about international graduate student visa revocations and status changes to then-interim President Jim Davis.
“Faculty council is an important space to raise issues around graduate education in a way that provides accountability and transparency,” Spicer said.
The UT System Board of Regents ended faculty senates and councils at its institutions on Aug. 21 to comply with Senate Bill 37, which requires faculty councils to be solely advisory as opposed to autonomous, represent the entire faculty and set term limits for members by Sept. 1.
The University is currently coordinating with the board to develop a new model of faculty council that utilizes its faculty’s advice and academic expertise while following SB 37, University spokesperson Mike Rosen wrote in an email.
In the meantime, the board has authorized system presidents to temporarily establish faculty advisory groups, UT System spokesperson Benjamin Wright wrote in an email.
Spicer said limiting the autonomy of faculty councils makes it more difficult to maintain an environment of accountability.
SB 37 requires the Board of Regents to annually review the core curriculum at system institutions and make recommendations to remove or keep courses, according to the bill. SB 37 also mandates courses not to teach “identity politics” or the idea that systemic oppression is “inherent in the institutions of the United States.”
Spicer said SB 37 is an extension of Texas SB 17, a 2023 law that ended diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives at public institutions of higher education.
“A lot of faculty saw SB 17 as trying to leave the classroom untouched,” Spicer said. “SB 37 presents a further encroachment into the classroom (and) into teaching, with political control over curriculum (and) major certificates.”
Spicer said the law endangers faculty who teach or research topics targeted by the bill. Texas’ political climate is pushing faculty out of the state, he said, a trend that will continue as SB 37 is implemented.
“The environment of having to constantly look over your shoulder often distances or pushes faculty from UT and from Texas,” Spicer said. “I’ve had several faculty I know that have left UT and gone to other states that have stronger protections for academic freedom.”
Lena Mose-Vargas, vice president of the Graduate Student Assembly, said SB 37 and SB 17 create a model for attacks on higher education in other states.
“(SB 37) sets a standard for higher education,” Mose-Vargas said. “It moves beyond Texas, and it is shaping higher education on a national scale, especially with this particular administration that we’re in.”
